The 2023 Academy Awards: An Emotional Night of Comebacks and History-Making

Ke Huy Quanamp8217s Best Supporting Actor early win for Everything Everywhere All At Once really set the tone for the rest of the night making history as the first Vietnamborn actor to win an Academy Award and only the second actor of Asian descent to win in this category quotMy journey started on a boatquot he said during his acceptance speech quotI spent a year in a refugee camp and somehow I ended up here on Hollywoodamp8217s biggest stage They say stories like this only happen in the movies I cannot believe itamp8217s happening to me This is the American Dreamquot Quan has won the category at every major awards ceremony this year including the Critics Choice Awards and Golden GlobesJamie Lee Curtis had one of the more surprising wins of the evening as she was alongside Angela Bassett Hong Chau Kerry Condon and her costar Stephanie Hsu Visibly shocked and inaudibly saying quotOh shut upquot when presenter Ariana DeBose said her name Curtis took the stage to deliver the second of many emotional speeches of the night quotTo all of the people who have supported the genre movies that I have made all these years the thousands of people we just won an Oscar togetherquot she declared She also thanked her parents Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh both of whom were nominated for Oscars in their careers but did not win quotWe just won an Oscarquot she said looking toward heavenRuth E Carter previously made history in 2018 as the first African American to win an Academy Award for Best Costume Design She picked up her second Oscar last night for the filmamp8217s sequel Black Panther Wakanda Forever quotThank you to the Academy for recognizing the superhero that is the Black womanquot she said to a roar of cheers quotShe endures she loves she overcomes she is every woman in this filmquot With her win Carter also became the first Black woman to win multiple Oscars Carteramp8217s mother Mabel Carter had passed away the week before She explained that Wakanda Forever had prepared her for that loss quotChadwick please take care of momquot she movingly saidEverything Everywhere All At Once writersdirectors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert known collectively as quotThe Danielsquot enjoyed multiple wins for Best Original Screenplay Best Director and Best Picture Kwan made history as the first writer of Chinese descent to win an Oscar in the Best Original Screenplay category Scheinert made a point to thank the quotteachers that changed my life most of them public school teachers You educated me you inspired me and taught me to be less of a buttheadquotHe also thanked his parents for not quotsquashing my creativity when I was making really disturbing horror films or really perverted comedy films or dressing in drag as a kid which is a threat to nobodyquot earning waves of applause from the audiencequotWe are all products of our contextquot Kwan added quotI want to acknowledge my context my immigrant parents My father who fell in love with movies because he needed to escape the world and passed that love of movies onto mequot Kwan also thanked his mother who could not afford to pursue a creative career and instead bestowed it onto himTelugulanguage Indian film RRR once again won Best Original Song after several wins throughout awards season It was an esepcially welldeserved win after the highoctane performance by the cast of the film earlier in the ceremony Composer MM Keeravaani and lyricist Chandrabose took the stage to accept the award the former sharing quotI grew up listening to the Carpenters now here I am at the Oscarsquot Their song quotNaatu Naatuquot is the first nonEnglish song to win the award in fourteen years the last being quotJai Hoquot from Slumdog MillionaireAnother welcome win and major comeback story this year was that of Brendan Fraser who also won the Critics Choice Award in January for his role in The Whale quotOnly whales can swim at the depth of the talent of Hong Chauquot he gushed about his costar who was nominated in the Best Supporting Actress category I must say she was a standout in last yearamp8217s offkilter thriller The Menu and very well could have been nominated twice Fraser was surprisingly the first Canadian actor to win in that categoryIn her impassioned speech Best Actress winner Michelle Yeoh she began by saying quotTo all the little boys and girls who look like me watching tonight this is a beacon of hope and possibilities This is proof to dream big and dreams do come true And ladies donamp8217t ever let anyone tell you that you are past your prime Never give upquot Yeoh made history as the first Southeast Asian actress to win an Oscar for her role as Evelyn Wang in Everything Everywhere All At Once quotI have to dedicate this to my mom and all the moms in the world because they are really the superheroes and without them none of us would be here tonightquotHarrison Ford took the stage to present Best Picture which went to Everything Everywhere All At Once briefly reuniting him with his Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom costar Ke Huy Quan Executive Producer Jonathan Wang accepted the award thanking his wife and quoting one of my favorite lines from the film quotIf all this shiny stuff and tuxedos goes away I would love to just do taxes and laundry with you for the rest of my lifequotquotThis is for my dad who like so many immigrant parents died youngquot Wang said quotHe is so proud of me not because of this but because we made this movie with what he taught me to do that no person is more important than profits and no person is more important than anyone elsequotIn every respect the 95th Academy Awards was truly one for the history booksSelfpublished at MediaVillage through the wwwAvrioB2Bcom platformClick the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc 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The 2023 Academy Awards: An Emotional Night of Comebacks and History-Making

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Juan Ayala

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